George Eliot; a Critical Study of Her Life, Writings & Philosophy eBook

Immediately after their marriage, Lewes and his wife
went to Germany, and they spent a quiet year of study
in Berlin, Munich and Weimar. Here he re-wrote
and completed his Life of Goethe. On their
return to England they took a house in Blandford Square,
and began then to make that home which was soon destined
to have so much interest and attraction. A good
part of the year 1858 was also spent on the continent
in study and travel. Three months were passed
in Munich, six weeks in Dresden, while Salzburg, Vienna
and Prague were also visited. The continent was
again visited in the summer of 1865, and a trip was
taken through Normandy, Brittany and Touraine.
Other visits preceded and followed, including a study
of Florence in preparation for the writing of Romola,
and a tour in Spain in 1867 to secure local coloring
for The Spanish Gypsy. In 1865, the house
in Blandford Square was abandoned for “The Priory,”
a commodious and pleasant house on the North Bank,
St. John’s Wood. It was here Mr. and Mrs.
Lewes lived until his death.

IV.

CAREER AS AN AUTHOR.

Until she was thirty-six years old Mrs. Lewes had
given no hint that she was likely to become a great
novelist. She had shown evidence of large learning
and critical ability, but not of decided capacity for
imaginative or poetic creation. The critic and
the creator are seldom combined in one person; and
while she might have been expected to become a philosophical
writer of large reputation, there was little promise
that she would become a great novelist. Before
she began the Scenes of Clerical Life, she had
written but very little of an original character.
She was not drawn irresistibly to the career for which
she was best fitted, and others had to discover her
gift and urge her to its use. Mr. Lewes saw that
the person who could write so admirably of what a
novel ought to be, and who could so skilfully point
out the defects in the lady novelists of the day, was
herself capable of writing much better ones than those
she criticised. It was at his suggestion, and
through his encouragement, she made her first attempt
at novel-writing. Her love of learning, her relish
for literary and philosophical studies, led her to
believe that she could accomplish the largest results
in the line of the work she had already begun.
Yet Lewes had learned from her conversational powers,
from her keen appreciation of the dramatic elements
of daily life, and from her fine humor and sarcasm,
that other work was within the range of her powers.
Reluctantly she consented to turn aside from the results
of scholarship she had hoped to accomplish, and with
many doubts concerning her ability to become a writer
of fiction. The history of the publication of
her first work, Scenes of Clerical Life, has
been fully told, and is helpful towards an understanding
of her career as an author.